1. The Expert Consultation on the Development of Agricultural Statistics for Food Policy, organised by the Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific (RAP) of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), was held in Bangkok, Thailand from 28 June to 1 July 1999. It was attended by seven experts selected from different countries in their personal capacities, two observers, two representatives from the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), as well as FAO staff and consultants.
2. Dr. Prem Nath, FAO Assistant Director-General and Regional Representative for Asia and the Pacific, welcomed the participants to the Expert Consultation. In his address, he reminded the participants that access to food was a basic human right and that in the 1996 World Food Summit convened at FAO Headquarters in Rome, Italy, world leaders reaffirmed the role of food in the well-being of people. He related that the Summit set a goal of reducing the number of malnourished people by half by the year 2015. He further related that the Summit, recognising the importance of easy access to information on food, had recommended that appropriate measures be taken to establish Food Insecurity and Vulnerability Information and Mapping Systems (FIVIMS) at the global and national levels.
3. He explained that the Expert Consultation was organised to address concerns and issues in food information systems. He expressed his expectations that benefits can be gained from bringing together experts who can dissect the complex issues even as they come from diverse backgrounds and specialised fields.
4. He observed that the agenda items covered various issues related to the information requirements of national food security programs and food policy. He noted that foremost among these would be the development of the agricultural statistics system of a country. In addition, he emphasised that advance estimates of crop production, information on marketing of food, and data on post-harvest losses played very important roles in the formulation of food policy. He further emphasised the importance of careful and thorough analysis of all available information to support food policy studies. He was therefore pleased that these concerns were well covered in specific agenda items.
5. Going back to the World Food Summit, he noted the paramount importance that world leaders gave to the identification of shortage and surplus areas as necessary inputs to government plans to make available food to those in need at the appropriate time. He also noted that another major problem in this regard was estimating the number of malnourished people, a process for which FAO Headquarters had evolved a methodology. He was pleased that documents relating to these twin concerns would be presented in the Consultation for consideration by the Experts.
6. Lastly, Dr. Nath opined that planning and monitoring economic development as well as national food security programmes should benefit from the latest information technology. He therefore hoped that the discussions on agricultural information network in support of national food security would contribute to formulation of strategies to improve the flow of information to all decision-makers in food policy.
7. In closing, he reminded the Experts that the opinions they would express in the Consultation would be their own, and would not necessarily reflect the positions of their governments or organizations. He urged the participants to come up with useful recommendations after discussing the issues freely and frankly in a friendly atmosphere. Lastly, he wished the participants a good stay in Bangkok.
8. Mr. Hiek Som, Senior Statistician, FAO/RAP, in his capacity as Secretary of the Expert Consultation informed that the objectives of the Expert Consultation were to review different components of system of agricultural statistics to produce the information required for decision making in food policy. He mentioned that many aspects of such a system were included in the agenda, especially the major components. However, he pointed out that it was not possible to cover every aspect during the Expert Consultation, but areas of statistics which were generally weak in national systems of developing countries would also be covered.
9. He said that the Experts were carefully selected taking into account their experiences and knowledge on specific topics related to the theme of the meeting. Each one of them prepared a paper for presentation under various agenda items. Mr. Som was confident that the Experts would express frankly their opinions and make pertinent recommendations.
10. The Experts unanimously elected Mr. Noer Soetrisno (Indonesia) as Chairman, Mr. G.S. Ram (India) as Vice-chairman and Mr. Dibakar Paudyal (Nepal) as Rapporteur, of the Expert Consultation. The Provisional Agenda and Provisional Timetable were adopted with a few amendments in the time allotted for some sessions.
11. The adopted Agenda and List of Documents are given as Annex 1 and Annex 2, respectively. The List of Participants is given in Annex 3, while the Opening Address of Dr. Prem Nath is shown in Annex 4.
